Bitcoin Forum

I don't understand why the wallets must look soooo dull..?
Nearly all of them look like something from the time of WIN3.1 decades ago - clunky and clumsy..
Couldn't they be a bit more attractive? Mind you - some of them hold fortunes  ;D
MEC made a genuine effort in making their wallet stand out a bit..
But nearly all other wallets are just plain boring - when they should each actually look different - smooth and nice - to reflect the coin they are representing..
And no - I don't think just a coin logo is enough  ;)

Well to date they've been made by (unpaid) tech-heads for tech-heads, not for the "masses". This is changing. You will see much "nicer looking" wallets in 2014 on all platforms.

It is just not a priority.
You should compare it to industrial GUIs, not so much consumer ones.
Security, stability, reliability are key here, not eye candy.

I'm sure there are some very nice-looking wallets around though. But ideally you shouldn't use that as a metric but whether they store your coins safely or not.

Not seen any good looking wallets yet. Hive is looking better on that front.

But I agree, its not top priority

Absolutely - top priority should be security - I agree..

I'll look forward to some new designs when the devs gets around to that :)

devs don't do design. If you are a graphic designer/ui designer then lend a hand. You will be welcomed with open arms.

Money talks. And hive are getting investment right now. No reason for secure wallets to look ugly. Just like you say. Devs don't do design generally.

Another problem is that many of the wallets are multi-platform, and that means using cross platform gui tools like gtk or java... which generally look significantly crappier than native applications.  I think what is likely to happen is that the cross platform backends (like bitcoind) will get native OS frontends that look and behave like native applications (or even better). 

Also, right now, since almost all the wallets are open source and free, there's not a lot of economic pressure on developers to make their wallets pretty.

The more stylish you make something, the sooner it looks ridiculously out-of-style.

http://hallofshame.gp.co.at/images/qtime/acpanel.gifhttp://origin.arstechnica.com/reviews/02q3/macosx-10.2/images/cds-and-dvds.jpghttp://www.bestdownload.com/mp3s/screenshots/sonique_1.jpg

Compare with Qt:
http://www.ics.com/sites/default/files/snapshot2.png

True enough. Hive is going to be OSX only I believe, hence it will look nice(r), and stylised to suit the Mac. They have plans to monetise it somehow, can't remember how though ...

Good point.
Qt is very conservative in looks, but it also means that we don't have to worry about a new 'hip' design each year (so, is this the trend of the day skeumorphism or even flatter design, oh and of course people on different platforms expect different 'looks', oh all the shed painting...).

And it's a great widget library; all kinds of widgets are available, it's pretty easy to develop for without having to roll everything yourself (with all the additional testing and maintenance that entails).

Well it hasn't been priority, but could mean a next step in crypto, esp. for the alt-coins.
BIL is the first to try something in the form of a integrated wallet chat client. Sadly it's
not really used.

I can imagine something similar for coins like SXC; integrated webcamstuff, integrated webshop.

More and more functions that are now browser-based could be transported to wallet-based functions.
I think this will be a key step for most alt-coins to ensure long-term existence. Without usability there
will be no need to use alt-coins over BTC. But if they would have their own uses... integrated in the wallet,
who knows?

If you are developing a Mac app, you just have to keep up to date with the current dev tools to stay "current".

We don't all want Java or Windows 3.1 apps you know.

Personally, I don't care at all what you want :)

This is open source software, contributions are welcome, scratch your own itch.

Can be open source *and* pure OSX, free market  :)

I agree.  Bitcoin wallets still lack the appeal needed to satisfy the average person.  The importance of looks is bigger than most of us realize. 

make a paperwallet using hologram from bitcoinpaperwallet. very stylish :P

Average person does not use bitcoin. Average bitcoin user keeps coins in an exchange or at blockchain.info.

I think you mean to say "Average person does not use wallet".

But anyway, I think that is largely true. Let's educate them :)

No I meant what I wrote. Most people haven't heard of bitcoin yet and they don't use it. There are surveys floating around if you want to look it up.

Apologies.

Still, back to the point, when people do get round to using bitcoins, and if they choose wallets, the wallets should look like modern apps, not Windows 3.1 apps or horrible Java apps